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Editorial Team
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Asked: 2026-05-30T14:22:15+00:00

How do you add a column to the end of a CSV file with

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How do you add a column to the end of a CSV file with using a string in a variable?

input.csv

2012-02-29,01:00:00,Manhattan,New York,234
2012-02-29,01:00:00,Manhattan,New York,843
2012-02-29,01:00:00,Manhattan,New York,472
2012-02-29,01:00:00,Manhattan,New York,516

output.csv

2012-02-29,01:00:00,Manhattan,New York,234,2012-02-29 16:13:00
2012-02-29,01:00:00,Manhattan,New York,843,2012-02-29 16:13:00
2012-02-29,01:00:00,Manhattan,New York,472,2012-02-29 16:13:00
2012-02-29,01:00:00,Manhattan,New York,516,2012-02-29 16:13:00

awk.sh

#!/bin/bash

awk -F"," '{$6="2012-02-29 16:13:00" OFS $6; print}' input.csv > output.csv

My attempt above in awk.sh added the string to the end but stripped all the comma separators.

awk.sh result

2012-02-29 01:00:00 Manhattan New York 234 2012-02-29 16:13:00
2012-02-29 01:00:00 Manhattan New York 843 2012-02-29 16:13:00
2012-02-29 01:00:00 Manhattan New York 472 2012-02-29 16:13:00
2012-02-29 01:00:00 Manhattan New York 516 2012-02-29 16:13:00

Appreciate any help!

Updated awk.sh

#!/bin/bash

GAWK="/bin/gawk"
TIMESTAMP=$(date +"%F %T")
ORIG_FILE="input.csv"
NEW_FILE="output.csv"

#Append 'Create' DateTimeStamp to CSV for MySQL logging
$GAWK -v d="$TIMESTAMP" -F"," 'BEGIN {OFS = ","} {$6=d; print}' $ORIG_FILE > $NEW_FILE
rm -f $ORIG_FILE
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1 Answer

  1. Editorial Team

    You may add a comma to OFS (Output Field Separator):

    awk -F"," 'BEGIN { OFS = "," } {$6="2012-02-29 16:13:00"; print}' input.csv > output.csv

    Output:

    2012-02-29,01:00:00,Manhatten,New York,234,2012-02-29 16:13:00
2012-02-29,01:00:00,Manhatten,New York,843,2012-02-29 16:13:00
2012-02-29,01:00:00,Manhatten,New York,472,2012-02-29 16:13:00
2012-02-29,01:00:00,Manhatten,New York,516,2012-02-29 16:13:00

    EDIT to answer the comment of SirOracle:

    From awk man page:

           -v var=val
       --assign var=val
              Assign the value val to the variable var, before execution of the program begins.  Such 
              variable values are available to the BEGIN block of an AWK program.

    So assign your date to a shell variable and use it inside awk:

    mydate=$(date)
awk -v d="$mydate" -F"," 'BEGIN { OFS = "," } {$6=d; print}' input.csv > output.csv
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